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Aurora in N.Y.!!!!!!



 
 
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  #1  
Old October 31st 03, 04:09 AM
Tom Rankin
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Default Aurora in N.Y.!!!!!!

Hey Tom R. in Poughkeepsie!

I'm Tom R. in Poughkeepsie too! I saw it too!

Talk to me!

Tom Randy wrote:

Tom R. in Poughkeepsie,N.Y.


--
Tom Rankin - Programmer by day, amateur astronomer by night!
Mid-Hudson Astronomy Association - http://jump.to/mhaa

When replying, remove the capital letters from my email address.

  #2  
Old October 31st 03, 11:42 AM
Mark Rosengarten
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Default Aurora in N.Y.!!!!!!

I'm Tom R. in Poughkeepsie too! I saw it too!

I'm Mark R. in Newburgh, and it was delicious here as well!

Mark
The Catman
^..^


www.geocities.com/mark_rosengarten
Owner/Coordinator of the Neko Ultraportable Solar Observatory
Fun WITH The Sun for Everyone!
  #3  
Old November 1st 03, 01:22 AM
Lawrence Troxler
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Default Aurora in N.Y.!!!!!!

Tom Randy wrote:
: The past hour here in Dutchess county N.Y. we've been having a GRAND
: light show! After almost 30 years of astronomy under my belt,
: it's my first Aurora and it's AMAZING! AWESOME!!!

My first Aurora too!

Hi Tom, Tom, and Mark, it's nice to be able to compare notes this way.

I saw something of that display from East Fishkill, but I think that I
either I missed the peak of the display, or else I actually did catch some
strong activity, but didn't see much because of some night blindness
(a pulsating shimmering in my vision, which I get often), and/or was
not sufficiently dark-adapted.

I'm curious to find out whether my timing or my vision was
to blame.

I intially planned to keep vigil starting with twilight, but I accepted
an offer to eat pizza out, and didn't get my first peek until I got out
of the car at home somewhere between 7:30 and 7:50 (to the best of my
estimation).

At that point I was estatic because there was a distinct, large purplish
red smear in the northeast centered in altitude a bit above . This was
unmistakably it! It was happening! (This was especially nice after
fruitlessly setting the alarm for midnight the night before and stumbling
out to a quite ordinary night sky).

There was another large red spot in the southeast. I couldn't detect any
patterns or distinct boundaries of any of the red patches.

I noticed some faint whiteness to the north, which I thought at first
might be a very thin cirrus patch. But after getting more dark adapted,
I was excited to see with the help of averted vision, that this light
was actually structured into at least two distinct bands that extended
North to South, with distinct linear borders, quite unlike a cloud!
This perception was very fleeting; I saw it only off and on over the
course of a few minutes, but when it was there it was quite distinct, even
if very faint.

I was hopefull that either things would intensify, or I would see more
once I was completely dark adapted. But instead everything just
slowly faded, until by 8:30 I could detect nothing at all anymore.

: About 7:00pm ET my cousin's kid come's in and says "there's these wierd
: lights in the sky...." I froze and ran outside and HOLY SMOKES!!! Ribbons
: of pinish red light is streaming up to the N.E., blueish green ribbons to
: the north! I run home, jump in the car, drive to the nearest convienance
: store, grab 2 rolls of Kodak 400 and drive home, load the camera and start
: shooting. It faded out. 10-15 minutes later it fires up again and I shoot
: like a mad man. I hope these come out. Exposures of 10-20 seconds on a
: tripod with a cable release using the hat trick.

Do you have an estimate of the time of these two peak periods?
How bright was everything then compared to say, 8:00?
Is it safe to say that these peaks happened before 7:30? (That is the
earliest time I probably had first looked.) What did you see at say, 8:00 ET?
Was it comparable to what I was seeing at that time?

Sorry for all the questions :-)

Larry


  #4  
Old November 1st 03, 01:56 PM
Lawrence Troxler
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Default Aurora in N.Y.!!!!!!

Tom Randy wrote:
: On Fri, 31 Oct 2003 19:22:46 -0500, Lawrence Troxler wrote:
:
: I'm curious to find out whether my timing or my vision was
: to blame.

: It may have been timing and or light pollution. Read on...

By "vision", I meant my physical vision potential, which is entirely
different from the issue of light pollution!

Where I am, it's fairly quiet light-wise, except to the south
(where it matters most - argg) where there's the glow from an industrial
complex. Of course it's not like what you'd see camping out in the
Adirondaks, but really it's not that bad. Let me put it this way: if
you're suggesting that light pollution was my problem, then tell me where
you're observing from in po-town, and let me know if there's a spot around
there that I can set up!

I haven't yet got to figuring out what my limiting magnitude is, but I
certainly that night, for example, could see that trail of dim stars that
go southward from Cassiopeia toward Andromeda.

: I posted a few photos to the astro binary newsgroup, they came out o.k.

: Tom

Yep, the one over the housetop that showed Auriga is somewhat consistent
with what I was, at least in azimuth. Except in my case, I perceived the
peak of the redness as a bit farther up in altitude. So who know, maybe I
have more light pollution then I like to admit which obscures my view
close to the horizon. Also I was not able to perceive any sort of
structure in the glow that I saw.

Larry

  #5  
Old November 1st 03, 08:31 PM
Lawrence Troxler
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Default Aurora in N.Y.!!!!!!

Tom Randy wrote:
:
: Your in Fishkill so maybe you had some light poluttion to the north.


Ahh! Now I understand. Could be. Honestly, I've never paid any attention
at all to the low altitude north sky, because I never point my scope
there below Polaris (GEM user here).

So maybe there was a light pollution element, but I still have a hunch
that it wasn't a factor, unless all the interesting stuff with this Aurora
was happening within, say 20 degrees of the horizon.

Next time I'm out with the scope (or without it, for that matter), I'll
take a better look at the glow around the horizons.

If it's any consolation to you though, the remnants of the East Fishkill
IBM plant is across the street to my south. Apparently they still have
enough money to keep all the lights running all night. And aside from
Aurora's, the south is what's important for astronomy.

Larry


  #6  
Old November 2nd 03, 04:31 AM
Lawrence Troxler
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Default Aurora in N.Y.!!!!!!

Tom Randy wrote:
: On Sat, 01 Nov 2003 14:31:31 -0500, Lawrence Troxler wrote:


:
: If it's any consolation to you though, the remnants of the East Fishkill
: IBM plant is across the street to my south. Apparently they still have
: enough money to keep all the lights running all night. And aside from
: Aurora's, the south is what's important for astronomy.
:
: Larry


: Typical big business BS with those lights. My condolences. Layoff tons of
: people but keep the lights burning all night for nothing. Yeah, not TOO
: screwed up huh?

: I have to deal with the city of Poughkeepsie's damn lights, they wash out
: everything up to about 75 degrees from the S.E. to S.W.

: To get nice dark skies I have to go out to Millbrook or drive north about
: a half hour.


: Hang in there Larry, it could be worse I guess.

No, _MY_ condolences - you seem to have the bigger problem.

OTOH, It just occurred to me that I never actually talked to anyone in the
town government about this. Will do that on Monday.

Are you a member of the Mid Hudson group, BTW? Been thinking of joining.
Of course for me, the trek to Wilcox park is more of a trip than it is for
you. But then again, for all of about 20 bucks, I assume there would be a
phone call alert chain set up for events like these

Larry.

  #7  
Old November 2nd 03, 10:53 AM
Lawrence Troxler
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Default Aurora in N.Y.!!!!!!

Tom Randy wrote:

: It may have been timing and or light pollution. Read on...

Hi again, checking out your pictures, I'm just trying to integrate what
I saw, to what you took pictures of ...

Take Aurora_01.jpg, for example.

Looks like you've got Auriga at the horizon there. I saw the redness at
the same azimuth, but unlike what's suggested in your photo, it was
centered much higher - I remember it being a big featureless smear
centered around the altitude of Cassiopeia (maybe 40 degrees?). Try as I
might, I couldn't discern any structure in that glow, and it slowly faded
once I settled in with my lawn chair.fp

Let me ask you this: could you recognize the beam struture that shows in
your photograph, while you were looking at it?

Sorry for these questions!

Larry


  #8  
Old November 2nd 03, 04:43 PM
Tom Rankin
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Default Aurora in N.Y.!!!!!!

We try to keep politics to a minimum. But, the more people you have in
an organization, the more opinions you will get, and conflicting goals,
etc. What to do... ???

Regarding the phone call chain, we do that informally. We do not have
an organized list. There is actually a service online somewhere, can't
find it right now, that will call you if conditions are favorable.

Thanks for the kind words, Tom...

Tom Randy wrote:

Not a member of the club, I'm not into clubs really, too much politics and I
HATE politics. The have a decent web site. They seem to be a nice bunch of
folks though.

--
Tom Rankin - Programmer by day, amateur astronomer by night!
Mid-Hudson Astronomy Association - http://jump.to/mhaa

When replying, remove the capital letters from my email address.

 




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